“Would You Care for Weak Tea or Strong Tea?” How the Dowager Countess of Grantham Served Tea to Her Guests

Tea is always served by the host/hostess or a friend, never by servants. Tea is never poured out, then passed several cups at a time, the way coffee may be, because it cools very quickly. Instead, it is always taken by the guest directly from the hands of the pourer.” – Etiquette Scholar

The ceremony of making tea is almost always included in costume dramas like Downton Abbey or a Jane Austen film, such as Emma. When Maggie Smith as the Dowager Countess of Grantham invited her daughter-in-law, Cora (Elizabeth McGovern), to the Dower House for tea in Downton Abbey, the arranged time was most likely at four o’clock in the afternoon.

Cora and the Dowager Countess sit down to tea

In one particular scene, the two women entered the drawing room in which a small table had been laid out with an elaborate tea set, fine china, and silver spoons. An assortment of tiny sandwiches, cookies, and scones were arranged upon a beautiful batttenburg lace tablecloth that covered the table. Low tea (an Edwardian dowager would never have said high tea) was meant to blunt the appetite before dinner.

The duchess pours boiling water over the tea leaves in the tea pot

A tea ceremony provided an intimate setting between the hostess and her guests, for it was the hostess who prepared and served the tea, catering to each guest and handing them their custom-prepared tea one cup at a time. In this time honored ritual, one of the most important questions the dowager would ask was: “Would you care for weak tea or strong tea?” Cora’s preference would guide the Countess in the next stage of tea preparation, for if she said “strong tea,” then the Dowager would pour the tea as she had prepared it into Cora’s cup. Had Cora said “weak tea”, the Countess would pour a smaller quantitiy of the brew into the china cup, then top it off with hot water.

Cora eats a crustless sandwich as her mother-in-law prepares the tea

The Dowager would then ask her guest how much milk and sugar to add. She would have poured boiling water over the tea leaves in a tea pot, and steeped the leaves for three minutes, all the while conversing with her guests. At this point the water was no longer boiling. Then the Countess would pour in the milk. (If she poured it in first, she would have found it difficult to judge the strength of the tea by its color.) Hudson, the butler in Upstairs, Downstairs, said about pouring milk into tea: “Those of us downstairs put the milk in first, while those upstairs put the milk in last.”

In this instance, the Dowager leaves her guest in the middle of serving tea, a faux pas

History of Low Tea

On September 25, 1660, Samuel Pepys recorded: “did send for a cupp of tee (a China drink) of which I had never drank before.” By June 1667, tea was considered to be a healthy drink. One day Pepys arrived home to find his wife making tea, which his apothecary had found good for her cold.

Samuel Johnson was a self-described “hardened and shameless tea drinker, who has, for twenty years diluted his meals with only the infusion of this fascinating plant; whose kettle has scarcely time to cool; who with tea muses the evening, with tea solaces the midnight, and with tea welcomes the morning.” His chronicler James Boswell observed that “It was perfectly normal for him to drink sixteen cups in very quick succession, and I suppose no person ever enjoyed with more relisht the infusion of that fragrant leaf than did Johnson.”

Until the 1760’s, only the rich could afford teapots, which were made of silver. Then in 1765 Queen Charlotte commissioned Josiah Wedgwood to create a tea service made from his quality cream colored earthenware, which he named Queen’s Ware (with the Queen’s permission, of course) and gave to her as a gift. From that moment on he was the Queen’s potter. Wedgwood’s creamware was thin, attractive and durable. After receiving the Queen’s patronage, his firm became quite famous. The attractive new tableware quickly became popular, and by 1775 other manufacturers, including those on the Continent, had widely copied Wedgwood, imitating Queensware and creating increasingly fanciful teapots. It is said that this tableware was instrumental in spreading the popularity of tea.

Wedgwood Queensware, c. 1790. Image @Christies

In 1840, the Duchess of Bedford began serving tea with refreshments in the afternoon to appease her appetite before dinner, and the custom of afternoon tea, or low tea, took off. To read more about drinking tea between the 18th and mid-19th centuries, read my post about Tea in the Regency Era.

Some interesting facts about tea:

Notice, this is a change: The difference between high tea and low tea: Low, or afternoon, tea is served at four o’clock with light snacks, such as sandwiches, cookies, and scones. High tea is a full meal served with tea, including meat, bread, side dishes and dessert on a table of regular height. Hence high tea.

16th century tea bowl, Korea

Tea cups at first were fashioned after Chinese bowls without handles or saucers. In the mid 1750-s, a handle was added to prevent ladies from burning their fingers.

A saucer was once a small dish for sauce. During the Dowager Countess’s day, it was acceptable to pour tea into a cup’s saucer to cool the beverage before drinking it.

In the late 17th century, a lady would lay her spoon across the top of her cup to signal that she was through drinking. Other signals included turning the cup upside down, or tapping the spoon against the side of the cup.

Filling the cup with tea almost to the rim is considered a faux pas.

"Might I give you this cup?" The Dowager hands her tea to Moseley while visiting Matthew Crawley.

Anna, back in those days, luncheon consisted of light fare, or an amount of food that could fit in the palm of one’s hand. The time for dinner had been moved up to six in the evening, or even later. People became famished in the afternoon without some refreshment. In 1840, the Duchess of Bedford, to stave off weak spells, began afternoon tea with scones and light sandwiches. The custom then quickly spread.

We lived in London and always found tea and accompanying food warming on a damp, cold day and an antidote to having not enough heat generally everywhere you travel around. You needed this extra meal to stay warm and never gained weight from it.

In Downton Abbey, when the Countess picks up her sandwich with two hands, I found this odd and gauche. Emily Post, of course later, wrote if you must pick up food, you should use one hand only. So, what’s correct at this time period?

Pouring tea into a saucer cools it quickly. They would pour it back into the cup afterwards.

No rules about one or two hands for eating a sandwich. Could be the size of the sandwich. Some were cut into very small triangles and you would only need one hand, but if larger , to avoid the contents falling out, I don’t see why not two hands. As for not putting on weight by having afternoon tea; tea doesn’t have any calories unless you put a LOT of milk in but the contents of the sandwiches were cucumber slices which are all water.The bread would give you some roughage, so healthy eating all round. Oh, butter!!! The merest smear.A walk across the room would burn the calories of that up in no time.

Just a note about using the saucer to cool the tea. With hot chocolate in the 18th Century, there are engravings of ladies sipping the hot chocolate from the saucers directly. Saucers are useful for more than balancing cups.

High Tea is a British institution, and refers to a tea with what we could consider “lunch” foods. Though a misnomer, High tea in the US refers to an incredibly fancy tea with cakes, pastries, cookies, jams, and jellies. In C.M. & A.N. Williamson’s Lady Betty Across the Water, the eponymous heroine travels to America and when she resides with a Midwestern farmer and his family, she anticipates the “tea” they’ve promised her, but “[w]hen they say ‘tea’ here they mean the evening meal–the last one”–which was usually around 5 o’clock. In England, upper class society just getting their second wind!

I would love to have this situation resolved, for two of my sources mentioned that High tea is an American convention. Of course, these were not older sources but one etiquette book did mention that if one confused low tea with high tea, one was committing a faux pas. This online source from the UK states: ” The middle and lower classes would have a more substantial ‘high’ tea later in the day, at five or six o’clock, in place of a late dinner. The names derive from the height of the tables on which the meals are served, high tea being served at the dinner table.” Afternoon Tea, http://www.afternoontea.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=131&Itemid=18

High tea is not an American convention; it is English and refers to the height of the table at which it is served later in the day than afternoon tea. What is “an American convention” is inaccurately calling an afternoon tea a high tea simply because “high” sounds more “haute”! So do correct people on this every time you hear it so that we can get everyone in America straightened out on this once and for all!

Funny, Tony, because here in the US people can tell MY working class roots (farmers), as we call the evening meal ‘supper.’ All the city dwellers call it ‘dinner.’

Calling anything ‘tea’ sounds extremely fashionable to me, no matter what time of day referred to!

Growing up, when we used to have a dairy, the meals (at least for the working men), were breakfast, lunch, dinner, lunch, supper. Breakfast, of course, being at about 4 am, before milking, lunch when you were done, about 9, dinner at noon, lunch again at 4 before the evening milking, and supper at about 9 again before bed.

We (my husband, daughter, and I) lived in England for four years. (Loved every minute of it!) I always prefer my tea without milk or lemon (although I don’t object to lemon that much), so when I ordered tea anywhere, I always quickly added “no milk”. I sometimes received looks from the servers like they were thinking “odd American”.

In fact, we lived in a small Cotswold village not far from Bampton where the town scenes of Downton Abbey are filmed. Although I sometimes missed some of the American conveniences, it was a beautiful experience I would not change for anything. I still miss it.

Dear Vic — In this scene of Cora and the Dowager drinking tea, I was surprised to see Cora keep on her rather large hat throughout the meeting — in stark contrast to the Dowager’s bare head. It seems to me that both of these head-fashion-statements differ from the customs in the Regency period (which you so delightfully described in other posts). Could you comment on the customs of hat etiquette in this period? In any case, I’ve always wondered how ladies (of Regency and other periods) dealt with elaborate up-dos that have to fit under a hat outdoors yet also look perfect once the hat is doffed indoors! Thank you for any light you can shed on the matter; your blog is lovely.

Good question, Stephanie. A post on hat etiquette cleared up your question. While hat etiquette for men was quite detailed, it was different for women. Think about it. Those large hats were part of a woman’s coiffeur and were placed in situ with a number of pins. Imagine, if you will, a number of female visitors taking off their hats in the hallway. They would need to rearrange their hair afterward and retire to a dressing room and require the services of a maid, and the poor butler and footmen would have to find a place to stash these enormous confections.

It was best that lady visitors kept their hats on during tea. Less fuss, less mess. I love what this blog writer said: “The hats worn by women were an integral part of their outfits and were never removed. Would you ever take off your dress in public? Women would be naked without their hats.” http://www.manyhattyreturns.com/2010/08/16/hatequette-for-women/

About the hat question (for afternoon tea today): The hostess might be the only lady at tea not wearing a hat. The guests are coming in from outdoors and do not need to remove their hats, but the hostess has presumably just dressed on the premises and would not have donned a hat.

This was fascinating! Thanks for all of the information from both sides of the pond. I serve teas in my home for my friends, low teas, according to this post. It is true that we Americans have got the wrong idea about what a high tea is. In my research I knew that it was really more of a meal but I had the fru fru idea that an Afternoon Tea, as my friends and I call it, was more about special treats. My Afternoon Tea starts with a savory item, is followed by scones, and then small pastries and sweet little treats. We think of it as a copy of a British Tea, but it sounds like it’s a bit off.

Love the distinction between low table and low tea and high table and high tea. I’ll share that with all of my tea drinking friends. I’m doing one this week and will be more understated.

Re “high” vs. “tea”: I went to graduate school in Scotland, and while there, lived in a sort of student hostel which offered single rooms, shared bathrooms, and 2 meals a day for the cheap price of 5 quid/week.

On the weekends, we were on our own for food except for Sunday nights, when a casual “high tea” was served up buffet style for anyone who was around and hungry. “High tea” was exactly what’s been described by several others on this blog–a full meal, often with cold cuts and, if I recall correctly (it’s been 40 years!), sometimes we’d have cold spaghetti as a treat. It was the opposite of fancy; it was more like a very casual family-only meal, where maybe still-edible leftovers from the week’s meals could be given a second chance.

When we went to fancy tea rooms (only as special treats–I think there was a spot in Edinburgh called something like “Dimmock Howden” or Brown’s or Fortnum Mason in London), it was for “tea”–I don’t recall the expression “low tea” ever used.

In the San Francisco Bay Area where I now live, there are thankfully lots of places to have tea. However, as noted above, the term “high tea” is often used–as someone else mentioned up-post, this probably sounds fancier but it is indeed a misnomer.

Thanks for the chance to relive my past. And for giving me something to do while we wait for Season 2 of Downton Abbey, which can’t come soon enough!

I enjoyed this post very much. (I apologize for commenting months after the original posting, but I’ve just come across it now.) I learned quite a bit from all the information, but I do have two minor quibbles that I’d like to note.

1. The caption to your second image, “The duchess pours boiling water over the tea leaves in the tea pot,” is not quite correct. At that exact moment in the scene, the Dowager Countess was pouring a bit of hot water into the empty tea pot in order to warm and clean it. We can be sure of this because her daughter-in-law still has both of her gloves on. By the time the Dowager Countess is actually pouring hot water onto tea leaves in the tea pot, her daughter-in-law has mostly removed her gloves (the show actually has a slight editing error here, showing more glove on that it should have).

2. I wonder if your choice of the Kizaemon tea bowl might be somewhat confusing. I have to admit that I know nothing of the history of British tea cups. But based alone on your note of the fact that British cups took as their example Chinese teawares, I think it at least somewhat misleading to then use an image of a Korean/Japanese bowl, which would have little in common with most Chinese tea bowls. I guess your main point was to show a bowl without a handle, which certainly includes the Kizaemon bowl. However, the differences between this bowl and most Chinese tea bowls are quite great. Even if it was just to illustrate an East Asian tea bowl without a handle, I think it’d be more accurate to use an image of an actual Chinese bowl. As of writing this, I have no idea what kind of Chinese tea bowls influenced British tea cups, but I think once we have that information, it might give a clearer picture as to what the Chinese precursor to British tea cups could have looked like.

I hope you don’t mind that I’m a bit late to the game, but I’ve been reading through the blog and enjoying it tremendously. My attention was caught by the note at the top, where it says that, “Tea is always served by the host/hostess or a friend, never by servants.” Does this come with a particular time period? The reason I ask is that I found this passage in the 1825 version of Samuel and Sarah Adams’ The Complete Servant: “The tea tray is carried up by the Butler, assisted by the footman; and in waiting at tea, the Butler hands round the cups on the tray, the footman assisting with the eatables.”

The practice of discarding the first cup of tea from the pot was a custom since the early Chinese tea drinkers, which the British continued. It was believed to offer a gift to the spirits. I was pleased to see the duchess follow this custom.

^^ I learned the above from “For All the Tea in China”, an excellent book about the story of how tea was smuggled from China, by a Brit named Robert Fortune working for the East India company. He brought the plants and seeds to India to become the full-fledged industry it is today.

Very interesting post! I am an avid collector of tea cups and since seeing the episode of Downton Abbey where Maggie Smith’s character pours tea, I have been longing to find this china pattern. Does anyone know who the maker of the china is and what the pattern is called? Thanks!

Just want to clarify that the Dowager Countess was not discarding an entire cup as an offering to the spirits… she was merely warming up the tea pot. The proper way to prepare tea is to first pour a little hot water from the kettle into the teapot (no tea leaves at this point), swirl the water to warm the tea pot and then pour it out. After this, you add more hot water and tea leaves to prepare the tea.

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Hello, my name is Vic and I live in Richmond, VA. I work in program and professional development at Virginia Commonwealth University, and I have adored Jane Austen almost all of my life. I am a proud lifetime member of the Jane Austen Society of North America. This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. I do not accept any form of cash advertising, sponsorship, or paid topic insertions. However, I do accept and keep books, DVDs and CDs to review.

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